This invention is in the field of vehicle instrument panel displays.
Muscle or shape memory wires are known for use in various applications. The wires are made from a shape memory or bio-metallic material such as a nickel-titanium alloy. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,138,779 discloses an animated novelty button incorporating a muscle wire for selectively disclosing a hidden message. U.S. Pat. No. 5,831,820 discloses a muscle wire mechanism for ejecting a tape or disk from a storage house. A co-pending application assigned to the same owner as this application uses a contracting wire to change the position of a pointer on an instrument panel gauge, such as fuel, voltage, and temperature gauges.
The wires are often called xe2x80x9cmuscle wirexe2x80x9d because they flex or shorten in length like muscle fibers when electrical current is passed through them. The wires contract quickly and silently. When power is shut off, the wires relax and cool, and return to their original length. A typical muscle wire is commercially available under the name xe2x80x9cFlexinolxe2x80x9d. The specifications for different types of muscle wire vary, depending on the application, as to voltage, current, resistance, power, mass, wire length in relaxed and contracted conditions, and wire force.
Vehicle instrument panel displays typically comprise one-for-one LED/message window arrangements in which all possible messages displayed to the vehicle operator are single-purpose displays, each with an individual LED backlight, a reflector, and a translucent color-coded message window. The use of multiple LED backlights and message windows increases cost and takes up valuable space on the instrument panel.
Briefly, the invention is a muscle wire activated display mechanism for a vehicle instrument panel, in which an array of muscle wires is connected to an array of independently-activated message xe2x80x9cplatesxe2x80x9d movable into and out of a single LED-backlighted display port. Depending on the signal that a signal-generating device such as a vehicle microprocessor determines should be sent to the vehicle operator, the appropriate message plate (ABS, seatbelt, low oil, etc.) is moved by the appropriate muscle wire through a mechanical range of motion into the display port, whereupon a backlight (preferably a multi-colored xe2x80x9cRGBxe2x80x9d type LED) lights a translucent message portion of the plate to give a visual indicator to the driver. Cost and the amount of instrument panel space taken up by displays are both reduced.
These and other features and advantages of the invention will become apparent upon further reading of the specification in light of the accompanying drawings.